Kelsey Smith murder suspect's teen years filled with trouble [View All]

[proud2BlibKansan]

Hints of violence echo in the boyhood of the man accused of killing Smith.
By LAURA BAUER and DIANE CARROLL
The Kansas City Star

An Emporia, Kan., couple adopted Edwin R. Hall when he was 7 because they wanted to give him a better life.

Eight years later, after Hall was convicted in juvenile court of threatening his adoptive sister with a knife, he went back into state custody. He would spend the next three years in four juvenile correctional facilities and never return to his adoptive home.

The 26-year-old Hall now sits in the Johnson County jail on $5 million bond, accused of kidnapping and killing 18-year-old Kelsey Smith one week ago today. His attorney, Paul Cramm, declined to comment Friday.

Also Friday, Johnson County District Attorney Phill Kline said Smith, who was taken from an Overland Park Target parking lot, was strangled with a ligature that he would not identify.

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